Social Anxiety and Me This Week

Every day social anxiety is a part of my life. These days I'm fortunate enough that it does not overwhelm me. Well, not usually. More often than not I don't even notice its presence. I like to think it does not control me but as you'll see in the following example, that's not always the case. 

I didn't do menu planning this week so I went to the supermarket three times in a few days. I happened to see my neighbour who works on the cash registers.  I worried he might think I was weird for coming in more than once in a few days. Then I recalled that recently when I went to his cash register I had blushed, probably because I was in a hurry that day and feeling guilty for not being more organised.
Now, I really enjoy having the chance to chat with him as he is just about the only local person I know in this area who I do get to talk to. We do say hello to other neighbours but it's never more than passing small talk.

Yesterday, while having a typical SA moment of indecision as to whether I should go to his cash register or not, I plucked up the courage and focussed on being  in the "here and now".
I went to his cash register. Everything was OK.  We had a quick chat and I noted for a microsecond that I wasn't blushing and felt rather happy about that. The shopping was done and  I went on my way. 

The "here and now" strategy worked really well. "Here and now" was the mantra I learnt to use years ago when social anxiety was getting in the way of me being able to communicate with some of my colleagues. It was like a quick prompt when my mind was going off track.

As you can see in the example above, my mind can get distracted by a hundred trivial thoughts while I'm in the middle of even the simplest of interactions. 

In order to be focussed on the person I was talking to, I used to say to myself  "Right here and now" as a reminder to stop thinking about  what might have happened the week before or the year before and to stop worrying about what the other person might be thinking. Saying "here and now" signalled that I needed to get back on track i.e. get on with the very reason why I had come to see that person, right there and then. 

It's not something I mastered overnight but after practising for a couple of years, it got a lot easier.
It really helped on Tuesday when I wanted to be able to talk at that very moment and I didn't want social anxiety to stop me from having a friendly chat.